Back to Kate Batts

I have been mulling her over quite a bit. I'd like to understand better what was meant by "witch" at the time (both at the time the story was first written down and at the time it was supposed to have taken place). We frame this as a ghost story, but it's not exactly a ghost story. Have I shared with y'all Pat Fitzhugh's site? He does a good job of stressing that the "witch" was a supernatural entity, not a particular person.

But he also gets right into the meat of what I want to better...